Give a lead to save a child

Crowdsourcing success in Europol’s Trace an Object campaign

Europol's Trace an Object Campaign has led to the identification and rescue of 26 children who were victims of child sexual abuse. Tips submitted by the public have enabled national authorities to identify and prosecute five offenders for child abuse. Such tips have also helped investigators determine the country of origin of the abuse material in 127 instances.

In total, almost 28 000 contributions from the public have been received, but more are needed. Every piece of information counts, as it may help law enforcement authorities identify and locate children, sometimes as young as three years old, and remove them from ongoing abuse.

Increase of child sexual abuse material online

The production and distribution of child sexual abuse material has become increasingly reliant on the Internet, contributing to the proliferation of this crime. Over the past three years, Europol’s database of images and videos has grown by more than 20%. Today, a phone camera has replaced the complex filming setups of past decades, enabling offenders to produce and distribute material almost simultaneously. They use end-to-end encryption applications to exchange child abuse material. Live-streaming platforms facilitate live-streamed child sexual abuse, while encrypted applications enable communication between traffickers and buyers.

These technological advancements hinder investigators' efforts to identify victims and perpetrators. Additionally, AI-generated imagery further complicates efforts to safeguard children. The use of encryption by offenders and AI-generated child sexual abuse material highlights how technological developments pose additional challenges to law enforcement in ensuring public safety.

Public contributions needed

The exponential increase in online child sexual abuse material means new strategies and techniques are needed in order to combat this crime. Cooperation between private and public actors is crucial to overcoming the digital challenges posed by the criminal use of new technologies. Law enforcement are exploring new technologies to help process the vast amounts of images and videos, identify series imagery depicting the same child, and narrow down the country of production to find the abusers and the children, some of whom are still in harm's way.

Despite these efforts, many victims remain unidentified. Victim identification specialists scrutinise images and videos frame-by-frame to find anything that could lead to the origin, location, or identity of the victim. Some background elements, like streets, TV programs, or logos, are easily recognisable, while others are difficult and country-specific. Public assistance through tips sent via the Trace an Object Campaign can help Europol’s victim identification specialists and national law enforcement authorities narrow down the image to a country, identify the offender, and ultimately save a child.